The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: The Black Tempest
by MissAcedia
Summary: The League has been called again, in a time of peace. The members soon learn that is it not the present that holds the danger, it is the future. With the confusing and intriguing new addition of Amelia Storm, a woman not of their time, they must fight an evil that will spread the entire world and kill millions if they don't stop it.


_Some overview:_

_This story will follow mostly the characters defined in the movie with some input from the comic series and backstory. In this universe, M was not the leader of the league, Quartermain and Dorian did not die. The events from the movie DID take place except R was the leader of the league and Moriarty was the villain not attached to the league, nor did Dorian betray them. Any necessary clarifications will be written as they are needed. The perspective will change throughout but I'll make it clear when I do so. Rated K for now except for some light language, may change later. There is no slash yet but there will be eventually ;). Enjoy!_

**Chapter 1**

**An Extraordinary Reunion**

There was very little that escaped Wilhelmina Harker's attention, and she was always paying attention.

She did not feel the cold, damp chill of the London air as the other people bustling about on the street did, hands tucked into pockets or muffs, collars turned up against the wind. She felt it, but it meant nothing to her, it had become more of a lesser sense than a feeling. In the few, yet long, years since her transformation, she'd nearly forgotten what it felt like to be chilled. Sometimes it felt downright unpatriotic of her not to be miserable and cold for three quarters of the year.

One such frigid gust caught in her short veil and threatened to pull it and her crushed velvet hat from her head. With small frown, she reached a gloved hand up to right it, patted her scarf in place and started across the sodden, slushy street. With the stiff grace that had become her skin and armour she wove herself between the crush of miserable humans and bulky carriages, not making a sound, her scarf and overcoat trailing in the wind like wisps of smoke.

The air cleared somewhat as she stepped off the street and up the steps of the British Museum. When she reached the imposing marble columns a young man in white gloves and plainly cut yet expertly-made black jacket appeared beside her.

"Good afternoon, Ms. Harker," he said sharply, adjusting the gold button with an emblazoned "L" in green enamel on his cuffs. "This way," walking to the door, opening it with directing her in with a curt gesture.

She held back an obvious sneer and instead slowed to a stop steps outside to door. She met his eyes and held them until the pompous confidence in them quickly seeped out and was replaced by cloying cold fear, a pink flush slowly creeping into his face as he saw her eyes glide to the quickening pulse in his neck, then back to his eyes.

"It is '**_Mrs_**. Harker'" she said smoothly breaking the eye contact and gliding through the opened door. "And that will be all."

She heard a small, weak "Yes, ma'am" before the door closed with a groan behind her. She continued briskly across the expansive great room, her footsteps muffled by the plush oriental carpet. She needed no eager young butler who managed his way into a secret society of sorts telling her where to go. It was not the first time she had been summoned by R to the Museum HQ, the current League had been formed for almost two years now, meaning the reason the young man had a position opening doors in no small part BECAUSE OF HER.

With a small smile, she was comforted by the thought that he'd now never forget it.

She silently navigated her way to through the granite columns and alcoves to the tapestry of a fairy queen. A second, much older, gentleman in white gloves approached her with a much more respectful greeting. She slowed to a stop, her velvet overcoat swishing against the stone floors. The gentleman pulled back the tapestry and produced two keys from his breast pocket and turned to the wooden door that had been hidden behind the tapestry. She heard what would have been faint grinds and rasps to other ears as the lock's tumblers slid home then watched the door swing slowly inwards. The gentleman stood to the side holding the curtain and nodded to her with a quiet "Ma'am."

"Thank you Mr. James." She sighed, unbuttoning her glove at the wrist. "Might want to keep an eye on the new addition," she said with a gesture to the front entrance. "He's not quite up to your standards."

"Indeed I will, thank you ma'am," he replied, eyes down, as he closed the door behind her.

Her eyes needed no time to adjust to the dark of the stone staircase. She descended quickly into the cold damp that was only broken by a beam of light from windows high above her. In the quiet, she felt free to contemplate the reasons the League had been assembled now. There was relative peace in England and in Europe at large, even through the underground channels she had contacts in. Her gloved hand brushed the curved brick walls as her boots tapped against the steps. What did R know that she didn't?

She sighed, if the past predicted anything, then what R knew that they didn't could fill many books.

Her thoughts were interrupted by the rasping scrape of the door many floors above her now opening, then the boom of it closing reverberating off the brick walls. She stopped and turned, waiting to see who had joined her. She saw nothing, although she heard some quiet slow steps approaching.

"Hello?" she called, a faint echo of her voice ringing in her ears. The silence that followed was nearly deafening. The steps had slowed, and then continued at a careful, measured pace. The hair on the back of her neck stood on end, she sensed danger and she straightened, shaking back her shoulders. There was no fear in her eyes, an immortal vampire feared nothing. Instead, they began to fill with red, the victim was almost here. She let the hunger reach out from a small, controlled part of her mind and take over her senses. She could hear a slow calm pulse. She felt her fangs appear with a slow smile.

"Show yourself" she hissed slowly, daring them to attack her. The steps stopped. Suddenly out of the black gloom a wide dark object came at her, blocking her field of vision. She deftly sidestepped it, catching it with her arm and slammed it into the wall.

"Easy now Mina," came a teasing, commonly accented voice from behind her. "That's bran' new. Didn' know you were into leather, alls you 'ad to do was say so."

"Damn you, Skinner," Mina rasped, flinging the coat over one arm and fixing her loosened scarf with the other, her eyes completely back to normal, if not now filled with absolute loathing and rage. "League or not I will rip you to pieces if you attempt that again."

"Sounds like fun" chuckled the voice, now a few steps below her. "Hurry up," Skinner called, as if over his shoulder, voice now coming from far below her. "You're late."

"You're lucky you're useful," Mina hissed quietly, continuing her descent.

"For now."

Mina squinted slightly at the stark bright of the room as she entered through the heavy carved wooden door. Fully lit lamps were tucked into the alcoves and placed at even intervals along the table that dominated the room, illuminating the tall portraits of past leagues framed by mahogany bookshelves that reached the high vaulted ceiling. The only dark she saw was at the very end of the long table. She could see R's outline tucked into that darkness as if it were emanating from R herself. Closing the door behind her she nodded to R and asked "Am I late?"

"Relax milady," came Skinner's voice by the brandy table. She watched, eyes narrowed, as a crystal decanter rose into the air as if on its own accord and poured a generous measure of its contents into a matching tumbler. "Nemo an' Sawyer's not even 'ere, and R'd never start wifout our 'fearless' 'batty' leading lady."

"Coat **_on_**, Skinner," she seethed, depositing his seemingly only item of clothing, besides maybe a wide hat, into his chosen seat near the end of the table. She gracefully settled into her seat under the portrait of Gulliver's League from the 1750s, and as she slowly unbuttoned her glove she let her senses tell her who had already arrived. Skinner was, annoyingly, correct that Nemo had not arrived. His signature scent of sandalwood, seawater and metal were completely absent. No one could have missed Tom Sawyer's presence. The young American was brash, loud and expressive, unless he chose otherwise to be otherwise.

A soft grunt and a rustle of papers coming from the direction of the fireplace belonged to Alan Quartermain. Mina placed her gloves in her lap and looked at him intently. The older man possessed the impressive skill of impersonating total apathy. Mina knew better, however, otherwise he wouldn't be here at the museum at all. His clothing had changed little since his time in Africa, suggesting he'd only just arrived. Yet he had acquired a long coat in the process, flung on the back of the chair, meaning he expected to be in London for some time. Mina glanced at R with a questioning look, but R pointedly ignored her, gloved hands folded neatly on the table. There must be something terribly wrong for Quartermain to have emerged from his club in Kenya, for the second time in a decade.

Doctor Henry Jekyll stood stiffly at one of the bookcases, inspecting it's contents. She felt a small pang of sympathy for the man. A tall, kind, capable man of medicine with a curious nature who was now a slave to a demon of his own making. The only reason he'd joined the league was a fruitless attempt at assuaging his guilt tied to Hyde's actions. She noticed his hands, held behind his back, were free of any tremor. He was in control for the time being. She felt some relief, as HIM she was rather fond of. Hyde on the other hand...

She suppressed a sigh and resolved she could no longer ignore the figure leaning gracefully against the bookcase to the left of the portrait of Sir Francis Varney's League. She slowly glanced up and mustered a small smile.

_A woman's hardest job_, she thought to herself; _Fooling the wolves._

The long lean figure of Dorian Gray looked back at her through heavy lidded eyes complete with a thick set of lashes above high cheekbones and a perfectly groomed beard. His tailor was still supplying him with expertly-fitted decadent suits in varying shades of grey. He gave off an aura of lazy grace leaning lightly on his African snake wood cane that hid his steel sabre. Mina was amused, however, by his obvious attempts to impress her with his wit. Sir Frances Varney was another vampire leader in the League, a fact Varney tried to keep a secret as much as possible.

Amused, but not impressed.

"Dorian," she said softly, as if she were caressing the word.

"Mina," he replied in his velvet voice. "I wondered when I'd see you again, although I thought it would be much sooner. I sent you a letter inviting you to visit last summer but never heard a reply, I trust all is well?"

"I never received it," she replied, the memory of the letter curling into black ash in her fireplace rising unbidden to mind. "I have been busy with pressing business of late."

"Of course," he said, blinking slowly. He knew she had gotten the letter and disregarded it. She was no fool. If there was something they had in common it was the small enjoyment they shared with their trite exchanges.

Mina broke eye contact with Dorian as Quartermain cleared his throat pointedly, then by the door opening. All present glanced up as Sawyer entered, followed by the captain and his first mate, Ishmael. The young American tipped his hat with a cocky smile at Mina, who returned it, then, noticing Dorian's obvious sneer, gave the immortal a small but tight nod. Dorian gave no reply except to take a seat at the table, resting his cane across his knees. Sawyer glanced quickly back at Mina before approaching Quartermain where the younger man greeted the elder and they began talking to each other animatedly.

Nemo, dressed in his spotless, if not exotic, uniform of sea-blue and silver brocade and his ever present turban, greeted no one as he came to stand at the end of the table, one hand resting on his belt. His first mate silently positioned himself at the doors. Nemo adapted a stiff pose and his steely eyes stared straight to the shadowed end of the table.

"Now then," came a quiet, elegant voice from the dark. All eyes came to rest on R as she rose to her feet and turned up the lamp behind her. Turning back to face them, hands together in front of her. "Let us begin."

Jekyll quietly took a seat, while Quartermain set down his paper and removed his spectacles. Nemo and Sawyer remained standing.

"Yes, let's," Quartermain said with a note of impatience leaning forward on his elbows, giving R one of his steely glares which she returned. "What has the British Empire gotten itself into now that it can't undo itself? Even in my CHOSEN solitude from the ways of the world there is talk of the peaceful state of affairs, thanks in no small part to us," Quartermain huffed.

R was silent for a moment, never for a second breaking eye contact with Quartermain.

"Patience, Mr. Quartermain. If you had it, we would already be discussing the dilemma 'the British Empire has gotten itself into.' I expected that sort of behaviour out of your young protegé there, not you," she said evenly, with a small gesture to Sawyer, who gave an embarrassed chuckle at Quartermain. The older man fired a murderous look over his shoulder at Sawyer, who settled with a small smile in a failed attempt to look contrite.

"Now," continued R with a long look at Quartermain before turning to the neat stack of folders in front of her. She gestured with a hand to some point behind her and another white-gloved and black-jacketed man appeared seemingly from the shadows, gathered the folders and distributed them to the members present.

"You will see in front of you the plans and equations to some very advanced machinery which you will most likely not understand. Yes, even you Captain."

Mina glanced up from her papers at Nemo, who had opened his folder and was sifting through the papers curiously.

"Indeed," he replied. "Who's genius is this?"

R gave a small smile. "No one you'd know, at least not yet. Have any of you heard the name 'The Time Traveller'?"

All eyes turned to R, the room silent until Jekyll nervously leaned forward.

"You can't be talking about H.G. Well's character from his book? That is a work of fiction, he can't possibly exist."

"You act as if this surprises you, Doctor," R smiled, amused. "Here sits Allan Quartermain, and you speak of fiction as if it dealt in absolutes and never borrows from fact."

A blush crept into Jekyll face and he glanced around quickly before continuing.

"Yes, but Quartermain's adventures are grounded in reality and only embellished with fiction for his readers."

"Oh ARE they?" Quartermain snarled. "I don't remember you OR Hyde joining me on any of them so ..."

"Enough," sighed Mina, rolling her eyes. "We all chose to be here, let's let R tell us why."

"Thank you Wilhelmina," R sighed. "The reason none of you have heard of any impending doom is because it hasn't happened yet. The information and sources we have suggest we have six months before disaster strikes, and that the disaster will end the lives of millions across Europe before crossing the Atlantic and wreaking havoc there."

"I'm assuming one of these 'sources' is this 'Time Traveller'?" said Sawyer, looking up from his folder. "There's no picture of him, and almost no other information otherwise."

"No, there wouldn't be, Mr. Sawyer," continued R. "Mr. Wells and the Traveller have made sure that even we don't know anything about him other than a pseudonym. This may shock you all, but Mr. Wells didn't just write a novel on time travelling. He's made it reality. A few years ago he went into exclusion to form his theories for his novel, but when he showed them to the man who would become the traveller, a brilliant scientist in his own right, he was convinced time travelling could actually be done. They worked for two years non-stop with little contact from the outside world. When they believed they got it right, the Traveller decided to test the machine. He was able to travel far into the future and when he returned successfully he faked his own death and has been travelling through time with Well's machine ever since in secret."

Every one of the members' eyes were on R, and even Mr. Gray looked shocked, R noted with pleasure. A log in the fireplace popped and Sawyer was the first to break the silence.

"If Wells wanted to keep something like this a secret, why write a novel about it?"

"Well he had to explain his absence somehow," reasoned R. "He had already alerted those in the writers field he was writing about time travel, it would have been odd for him to suddenly return to the world with no novel and no explanation."

"But the science in the novel _doesn't work," _exclaimed Jekyll in an exasperated tone. "I know, I've read it! I'm no quantum physics expert but Well's practical application theories on time travel are absurd and no different from any other refuted scientific guessing done on the sub..." Jekyll trailed off with a stunned look and turned to Mina.

"Because he WANTS the scientific public to discredit him..." Mina said slowly, eyes wide. "No actual expert will look into his theories if he's known as a fictional popular novelist." Mina blinked at Henry, then looked at R. "It's genius."

"Precisely," clipped R.

"'Old on," cut in Skinner who had, blessedly, been silent and unseen until then, his whitened face and black eyes looking at R with confused doubt. "Are you telling' me that someone can ACTUALLY travel through time, see the ancient Egyptians an' the future an' such?"

R was silent for a moment.

"Perhaps I'm not the right person to tell you," she said quietly, as if to herself. Suddenly she looked up and gestured to Ishmael at the door. "Captain Nemo, if you please."

All eyes turned to the Captain and his brows knitted together in confusion as he turned to look at an equally confused Ishmael, then made a gesture towards the door. Ishmael nodded curtly and swung both doors open. His confusion multiplied tenfold as a figure strode through the doors, thanking him politely and stood near the baffled captain at the end of the table.

"Gentlemen, Mina, the League has a new member. This is Amelia Storm."

Mina did not shock easily, but it seemed to be a day for new experiences. The woman standing before her was clearly not from Victorian England. She might have guessed American, but even Sawyer seemed to be baffled by her appearance as well. Medium height, in her twenties, she'd guess, with long very light hair braided in a rope over her shoulder, wisps escaping it framing a heart-shaped face with wide dark eyes. She wore what Mina would have considered a man's black button down shirt but it was clearly cut for a woman in the waist and bust, the sleeves had been pushed up to the elbows, the tails left untucked. She wore a pair of fitted, equestrian-style dark-brown trousers with darker leather panels along the insides of the knees and along the thighs. The woman's boots looked to be equestrian as well except they had thicker rubber soles and came to just under her knees. Mina noticed a slight splatter of mud, suggesting she'd arrived the same way as her: on foot. Although how she avoided attention on London's sodden streets she could not guess.

While Mina had been making her observations, the woman named Amelia had been making hers, glancing around the room, greeting the fellow members. Dorian had stood right away, although it seemed Quartermain and Jekyll needed a minute to realise there was a female present and stood when she nodded at them, Jekyll still baffled, Quartermain composed if not with a suspicious expression on his face. She turned to Nemo who was closest to her, held out her hand with a smile.

"Captain Nemo I suspect, I've heard much about you."

"I regret I've heard nothing of you," Nemo replied as he returned her handshake, staring at the odd creature in front of him. After a moment he seemed to remember his hospitality and offered her a seat at the table.

"Thank you, but I'd prefer to stand for now," said Amelia, who turned back to R.

"Ms. Storm, I was just telling them of Mr. Wells theories and practical application. His REAL practical application. I felt you may be better qualified to explain than I."

"Perhaps I may," Amelia replied brightly. "While Wells and his Traveller were..."

"I wasn't aware the League was recruiting," interrupted Dorian smoothly. His cane swinging lightly as he went, he slowly made his way to the end of the table. "I failed to notice any qualifications for her in our notes. What _experience_ does she have that we require so _desperately,_" he finished, coming to a stop less than two feet in front of her, before circling behind her then making his way to the brandy decanter.

"I hate to admit this but I agree with Mr. Gray, in part," Jekyll interjected. He blushed as Ms. Storm gave him a hard look. "You seem very young..."

"I am twenty-three," she said sharply, apparently used to defending her age, and possibly her gender, if Mina assumed correctly.

"Almost a year older than Sawyer," she continued, pointing in his direction, his eyebrows raised slightly in admiration.

"Although if you want to get technical, I AM too young since I haven't even been born yet," she glared.

The other members looked at each other in confusion.

"What do you mean?" asked Mina.

"Ms. Storm was born in the year 2010 and has travelled to us from the year 2033 to help us fight a highly advanced chemical warfare that will wipe out nearly a third of the world's population if not more," R said sternly. "Any questions?" she said, daring them to test her. She was rewarded with absolute silence.

"Brilliant, let's carry on then.


End file.
